Daily Archives: Jan 10, 2012

When Mexico released the latest growth data on Tuesday, some media outlets were quick to point out that the figures showed the biggest monthly contraction in almost two years.

The so-called IGAE, which reflects monthly economic growth, contracted 0.6 per cent in October compared with September. That, in turn, pulled down growth over the previous 12 months to 3.7 per cent against the 4.3 per cent that analysts expected. But it would be wrong to get too despondent. Read more

Remember the heated debate over whether Brazil was heading for a credit bubble?

With the world economy almost in a tailspin and Brazilian growth stalling during the third quarter of 2011, the talk of over-heating in the middle of last year now seems like a distant – almost fond – dream from another lifetime. Read more

Argentine farmers, their fields parched, are obsessed with just one thing at the moment: rain. When it will rain. How much it will rain. And how much of their production – especially of corn – they can salvage if it does.

Rains did come on to some affected areas and a large swathe of Argentina’s farming heartland is forecast to get a stormy front late on Tuesday, bringing relief to a sector hard hit by the La Niña phenomenon. Read more

Turkey’s grand infrastructure plans have suffered a big setback, with the failure of a showpiece tender – the $5bn project to build a third bridge over the Bosphorus and an accompanying highway.

The bridge, announced in the run-up to last year’s parliamentaryelections, is one of the “megaprojects” favoured by the government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s prime minister. But although 18 companies expressed interest in the 414km project, none bid for the tender, which was cancelled as a result. Read more

Though the size of the deal remains undisclosed, the joint venture with state-owned Yunnan Tourism is the first such foray into China by an Indian luxury hotel chain, analysts told beyondbrics. Read more

Dry and windy weather across the Ivory Coast is sending the price of cocoa, the main ingredient of chocolate, soaring in New York and London. Cocoa to be settled in March has jumped as much as 14 per cent already this week on the ICE Futures US exchange – and sector watchers reckon this could just be the beginning. Read more

All customers, big and small, were requested to switch off all non-essential electrical equipment, including air-conditioning, geysers and swimming pool pumps, during the evening peak hours to ensure Eskom can keep the lights on. Read more

This week, the Polish currency has recovered – but mainly because Hungary’s has too, on the back of hopes that prime minister Viktor Orban can swallow his pride and strike a financing deal with the IMF and the European Union. Not easy, running Poland’s finances when all this is going on. Read more

China’s luxury market is booming, with Rolls-Royce reporting record sales and Western fashion designers opening flagship stores across the country. Yet in spite of this obvious appetite for bling, analysts say durable luxury goods are considered sound investments for the wealthy in China, many of whom are young entrepreneurs. Read more

The crowd was ecstatic as Bayern Munich’s striker Mario Gomez dribbled through India’s sloppy defence and scored. For once, Indian fans weren’t too fussed about seeing their side losing – as indeed it did, 4-0.

After all, Indians are not known for their passion for football. That is what Tuesday’s game at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in New Delhi was all about: winning over the Indian spectator. Read more

Has Russia finally licked inflation? Numbers released on Tuesday suggest that it has. The consumer inflation rate fell last year to 6.1 per cent, down from 8.8 per cent in 2010 and the lowest annual level since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

It’s a far cry from the 1992 peak of 2,520 per cent and a tribute to the fact that Moscow has for a decade pursued prudent macro-economic policies, whatever concerns there are about the lack of structural reform, corruption and state interference in the economy. Read more

African beer is big business and every brewer you can name is looking to gain a foothold in its fast-growing markets. Diageo, which already sells more Guinness in Nigeria than it does in Ireland, this Tuesday confirmed it has once again upped its presence on the continent by buying Ethiopian state-owned brewer Meta Abo for $225m. Read more

Tuesday’s top picks from the beyondbrics team: Nuclear developments in Iran condemned as provocative; fuel protests escalate in Nigeria; should Africa pay for Europe’s troubles?; a plea from Syria; potentially radical overhaul of healthcare in Romania sparks controversy; and a response to critisism of the Indian Prime Minister.Read more

Taiwan’s exports have been slowing for months but with the US economy showing signs of recovery recently and better-than-expected Christmas holiday sales for the tech sector, some people have started looking forward to a turnaround later this year.

Not so Hon Hai’s Terry Gou, who warned on Monday that the world faces a global economic downturn worse than the 2008/2009 financial crisis. Read more

First the good news. China’s trade surplus fell to a 6-year low in 2011, suggesting that rising domestic demand may help achieve some kind of re-balancing of the economy. That should benefit troubled western economies keen to sell more to China.